


Jigsaws with Missing Pieces

by Runespoor



Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, F/F, F/M, M/M, Melodrama, Multi, Pining, bittersweet with a strong helping of bitter, crackships taken seriously because this is how i roll, do you want to hurt about your ship cause i got you fam
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-03
Updated: 2018-06-02
Packaged: 2019-05-17 12:20:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14832153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Runespoor/pseuds/Runespoor
Summary: Sometimes the stories don’t have a happy ending. They might, at best, have a routine.[Once upon a time I was given twenty ships over the meme "give me a ship and i'll write you a way it could be spectacularly dysfunctional." These are the results: short to *extremely short* ficlets about each of these pairings.]





	1. the kitchen sink

**Author's Note:**

> I would like to stress that for the most part, I am fond of these pairings - the vast majority of them I'd call OTPs, so I beg you not to believe I intend any offense. I just _really_ like imagining ways for my Naruto ships to go horribly, horrendously wrong.
> 
> I have decided to arrange these in three chapters according to theme/lengths, because at least one takes up so much room I'm afraid it'd swallow the shorter ones, and I like the shorter ones, y'know?

**SasuHina:**

At some point, they discover it’s not enough to be in love with the same person, and by that stage it’s too late; Naruto thinks they’re as happy together as he is with Sakura.

 

**TemaShika:**

"Why don't you just _marry_ her and be done with it, if you want kids that badly?"

The sneer on Temari's face could have sliced through bone.

Shikamaru sighed. Then, without a word, he rolled off the bed. Picked up the articles of clothing scattered around the room. Had to look around a moment before he found the pack of cigarettes.

Temari's eyes had narrowed, he noted once he'd pulled his shirt back on.

"Run away all you want, asshole!" 

He didn't answer, and she made no gesture to detain him as he made for the door, only shouting louder. 

"One day you're gonna have to answer that question for good!"

Temari's words echoed like a threat even after he was out.

 

**InoSaku:**

Ino is still there. Night has already fallen but Ino is still there, and her smile grows more desperate with every passing second.

Neither Shikamaru nor Chouji mentions it.

"I don't want to get back," Ino finally blurts out. "I don't--"

But she doesn't finish her sentence; only looks away, out of the window of Chouji's room. Her gaze loses itself in the cold darkness out.

"It just -- it's never going to end, now, is it?"

Neither Shikamaru nor Chouji answers. Ino isn't expecting an answer anyway.

Naruto and Sasuke are dead, Sakura is left behind, and Ino is not enough.

They've already had their ending.

 

**NejiHina:**

Yes, Hinata-sama. Thank you, Neji-niisan.

They're so wrapped up in trying to break _(out of)_ the Hyuuga that they end up breaking themselves.

 

**IruAnko:**

Anko tried. Anko tried so hard. She tried to put it all behind. She tried to believe in what she had left. She tried to love him.

He was a good man. An _accepting_ man. He was a good ninja. Heck, he'd even be a good _father_ , if she ever sprung it on him that he'd knocked her up.

So Anko tried.

If anyone could make her happy, it should be him. 

He would even accept her for what she was - for what she had been. 

She didn't.

 

**LeeTen:**

When they're alone together, Tenten always feels like there's something missing, and when they're with their team, Lee always feels like he's lying.

 

**GaiKaka:**

Gai does his best, and he thinks that maybe, if it was just him and Kakashi - the challenges, the silences and the companionship - it might work.

But they have students framing their encounters - the team Gai is guiding, and the children Kakashi isn't.

 

**ShinoTen:**

She’s a normal girl. She thought she’d got used to silence, bloodline limits, and never knowing where you stood. She’d thought wrong. But he doesn’t say anything, and Tenten doesn’t want to be the bad guy. So she doesn’t leave and tries harder.

 

**Tsunade/Orochimaru:**

He doesn't understand why he hasn't killed her yet. 

He isn't sure he understands why she hasn't killed him yet, either, and that is almost more unnerving; Tsunade proved years ago that she was able to make a plan out of killing him, and he isn't sure he likes what it says that she has changed so much.

At the very least, she should want to kill him for being the reason her apprentice died; for being the reason the Kyuubi vessel was caught by Akatsuki, even if she'd stopped blaming him for Jiraiya's death. In _that_ , she had more of a responsibility than he did. 

But Tsunade's habit always was to automatically blame Orochimaru for everything Jiraiya did that went out of hand. 

She should want to kill him for wearing the skin of the one her apprentice and the Kyuubi vessel gave everything to try and save.

For allowing Konoha to be destroyed.

He should kill her, he muses sometimes when he sees her spending sleepless nights working silently in the laboratories of Sound. Tsunade is nothing but a memory of things he's since long outgrown.

He should.

 

**ItaHina:**

Genjutsu can make her sleep fitfully when she’s having regrets. Sometimes, Hinata isn’t sure she’s ever awake.

 

**Neji/Itachi:**

Neji can never leave the guilt behind. He can't leave Itachi, either.

If he did, it'd mean everything he sacrificed is meaningless; and that a golden cage really sometimes is better than a costly freedom.

It'd mean that some people really are happier in slavery.

_But still, sometimes, he's jostled out of sleep by Hinata's empty eyes, her dead stare boring holes through him across the corpse-littered compound._

_He finds Itachi awake, looking at him. Itachi never speaks; just looks at him with eyes almost as dead._

 

**Kiba/Hinata:**

“Why don’t you find yourself a nice girl to settle down with?” 

Hana’s tone is sarcastic, but her words aren’t.

Kiba looks away, and doesn’t reply, ‘one day she might need me’. 

Instead he says, “we’ve already talked about that, right?”

 

**KakaRin:**

He never liked her before Obito's death. (That is the crux of the matter, isn't it? _or it has to be, because he doesn't know what else could be. tell him what it could be._ ) 

_(Or if he did, it wasn't the way Obito did.)_

_Was it?_

It still isn't the way Obito did. (does.) _(He thinks.)_

He doesn't know who she likes in him, either.

(She still likes him. Them, _he corrects._ )

_(She puts her warm arms around him, and looks into the Sharingan with a perfect open smile she never wears when Kakashi's hitai-ite covers the left eye that isn't his.)_

When she dies and her name is a few lines under Obito's, he never goes to the cenotaph for her.

He doesn't know which part of him misses her. _(It's easier to miss her in his dreams, even if his dream self has black hair. It's the only colour that can be told in the red dream vision.)_

_(But his hands still look red.)_


	2. InoIta gets its own chapter because otherwise it's gonna drown out the rest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i understand from my body of works that i should have expected someone to request ino+itachi and boy am i glad they did.

He has no way out. He doesn't remember the things he has done, or why he is hovering in this shadow village where people never look at him in the eyes - even though it's pointless now.

He has no way out, Ino knows, because Sasuke is not waking up and Sasuke is the one holding the key to Itachi's freedom. 

Sakura used to have the key too, but Sakura is dead and Kakashi wasn't there to copy the world-altering jutsu she used on Itachi. Theoretically, he might be able to undo it with the power of his Sharingan, except that they are talking about Uchiha Itachi, and using one's Sharingan to do anything about him is not an option.

Ino doesn't really know how she ended up saddled with him, too. She knows why; she just isn't sure about the how. 

At first Itachi was staying with Naruto, because Naruto is without a doubt the person most involved about Sasuke, but it didn't work out. Then there was Kakashi, but he declined.

So Ino does it - Ino takes care of Itachi - because Sakura was her best friend and she died sealing Itachi away, so that when Sasuke wakes up he can undo whatever it is she did and he can finally kill his brother.

And everything will be over.

Ino is taking care of Itachi, she imagines, the sort of way people take care of the animals they're breeding, when they know they're going to kill and eat them. 

But Itachi is not an animal. He's too quiet to be an animal; too quiet to be any form of life, she thinks. He walks down the street without looking either left or right, only ahead, and he does no more noise now than he did when he was still himself.

Itachi has no way out until Sasuke wakes up, but Ino doesn't have much of one either. 

Taking care of Itachi has cut off most of her links with other people. Her team still visits, when they can; but she can't go see Kurenai and her child, now. Hinata is unfazed by Itachi's presence, but Neji hates it. Naruto - the person in the world Ino thinks she can best relate to nowadays - can barely stand glancing at him.

She can't think of Itachi as an animal, because Itachi, when he is not being quiet, can talk. Not about everything; there are wide expanses of blankness in his mind, where Sakura swiped away what was important. But they can talk about the little things.

Itachi was so little of a person, before, Ino wouldn't have been surprised that, once the things he'd done (and why he'd done them, and who) were gone, there'd be nothing left. He was so hollow to begin with.

It's the reverse that happens.

With the things that make him Itachi gone, it's almost like he's a person; a real person. 

Ino can talk about flowers with him. 

She can ask him to go and buy the paper, or if he wants to have take out when the fridge is desperately empty. 

She can tell him about Shikamaru's latest antics regarding Temari - the way he's completely denying he's keeping track of the days since the last letter, or the way he _mysteriously disappeared_ for over four hours during their last mission out of the village, only to return with a bitemark glaring at everyone above the collar of his shirt. 

Ino only knows this because of Chouji, of course.

Ino herself has a long-term mission in Konoha; taking care of Uchiha Itachi (though no-one calls him Uchiha anymore; he has lost that, as well) until Sasuke wakes up. Tsunade only agreed to name it a mission as a favor for Sakura's sake, Sakura's mentor to Sakura's friend. There isn't much else either of them can do. 

He's almost like a real person.

Except not really, because there's just so much _missing_. And even if there wasn't, in the end, he's still Itachi; meaning he's _not_.

Itachi never felt like a real person, from the tales Ino sought out.

And now, he's like the echo of a person; like a reflection through the mist.

He isn't real, and he doesn't even pretend all that well. Itachi used to be a master of genjutsu, and this transparent illusion of a person makes Ino hurt for him.

It'd be more humane to kill him now.

But she won't. 

In part it's because Ino is well aware she has grown attached in a way that will break her somewhat when he's finally put down.

Mostly, it's because he's all that remains of Itachi, and Ino fully intends on standing next to Naruto when Sasuke kills Itachi.

It's their only way out, now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sometimes i still kind of want to write the actual fic of that. 
> 
> also i fucking love how ino loves sakura.


	3. team seven disaster forever

**Naruto/Sasuke:**

Sasuke leaves every time, of course. 

Of course, Naruto goes after him. 

Sometimes they’re back by the time Sakura swings by their apartement – really Naruto’s, but for his sake she’ll say theirs. Sometimes they’re gone for months.

Sakura resents being left behind less now than she did when she was younger, but then, she has Ino. She grew up when Naruto and Sasuke didn’t, and what she fears nowadays is that one day they won’t come back at all and Konoha will hear about the obliteration of half a country, and there won’t even be the hitai-ite left to bury. 

She asked Naruto, once, why he kept doing it. It was one of the rare times when there had been signs that Sasuke would be leaving soon. 

(Once, it was Sakura ringing at the door that awoke Naruto – and it was then that Naruto realised Sasuke was gone. One of the times in the beginning, of course; back when Naruto didn’t wake up before the crack of dawn. Sakura remembers Naruto’s conviction that Sasuke was still there, then his bleak desperation; then the anger, blazing with the Kyuubi’s chakra.)

You’re not happy, she said as she dressed Naruto’s wound in a way that wouldn’t hinder the regrowth of his hand. Chidori; a sure sign that Sasuke was getting restless. 

Neither of you is happy.

Naruto looked at her. He’d tried and mopped up most of the blood with his sleeve, but there were still encrusted smears on his face, though his nose, Sakura noted, no longer seemed to be broken.

Sakura refused to think about the state Sasuke might be in. He’d been well enough to get away before she arrived in any case, and he wouldn’t let himself die from something so stupid as a friendly spar against Naruto.

“We couldn’t be happier, Sakura-chan.”

He looked like he couldn’t understand why Sakura would say that.

 

**Naruto/Sasuke/Sakura:**

Itachi always was the most important person in Sasuke’s life; his death doesn’t change that.

 

**Sasuke/Kakashi:**

Two wrongs don’t, after all, make a right, and two uncomplete people will never make a complete one, even if they don’t know what they’re missing.

 

**Sakura/Kakashi:**

“Sakura—” 

He catches her wrist before the slap connects; she glares at him for a moment before yanking her hand away. He tenses slightly in instinctive anticipation. 

She’s upset enough that her first reaction wasn’t _punching_ him. Kakashi doesn’t fancy fighting Sakura made unpredictable with anger – his sharingan is hidden beneath his hitai-ite and subduing her without using it would be uncomfortable, expecially if he has to worry about his own safety.

“Sakura, calm down,” he nevertheless finishes. His voice betrays none of his tension.

Her eyes are narrowed to slits, and she snarls, but she makes no move to hit him again – doesn’t move at all; blocking all her muscles to prevent herself from doing so, Kakashi recognises the terseness in her shoulders.

“I think, on the contrary, you're the one who should stop being so calm,” she hisses. 

Kakashi frowns, but Sakura continues.

“I’m the one doing all the work in this – _relationship_ , if you can even call it that with a straight face. Oh no, I forgot, of course you can keep a straight face!”

Her fists are clenched and her teeth bared. Kakashi would rather avoid this discussion, but he can’t just turn away now Sakura started it. It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen it coming, he berates himself. She’s been increasingly snappy recently, over the slightest things. 

He regards her for a few minutes, taking in the way the fingers of her right hand are trembling.

“You knew me,” he points out. His tone is mild but he doesn’t otherwise soften the blows of what he’s saying. It’s only the truth; and the sooner Sakura accepts it the sooner they can put this madness behind them. “I told you what you could and couldn’t expect. You knew what you were getting into, Sakura.”

Sakura’s jaw is clenching as well, now. Her eyes are brighter, too, but he isn’t sure if that’s because of the flame rage lit or because she’s going to cry.

“You won’t even talk to me with that mask down,” she accuses. 

Her voice breaks over the last word, and she looks down. 

Cold settles over Kakashi; knowing that he should, probably, take her in his arms and assure her that everything will be alright, but that she will see the empty words for what they are. She’s always been a smart girl; Kakashi wishes he could offer her the type of affection she wants. But he can’t promise it any more than Sakura would be disposed to believe a promise he wouldn’t mean.

Even for her, he won’t change who he is. Sakura knew this. He doubts she would have let him know how much his behavious hurt her if she hadn’t been at the limit of what she could take.

“Sakura...” Her gaze snaps up at him again, and Kakashi is struck speechless for a moment by the naked pain in her eyes. “You can’t heal me.”

After a moment, she nods feebly.

This time, Kakashi is the first to look away. In front of him, Sakura may be crying.

 

**Naruto/Kakashi:**

When a person has three teammates, and gets with the third because the two others are dead, there aren’t many conclusions to be drawn. That’s tragedy.

What comes afterwards is mere details.

**Author's Note:**

> The technically-twentieth ficlet, the one that doesn't have a tag, I took out of the chapter because I decided to up my standards, but here it is for your curiosity:
> 
>  **Yondaime/Tenten**  
>  He's dead.
> 
>  
> 
> i wrote this back when yondaime didn't have a name, do you realize how long i've spent sobbing over ninjas  
> this didn't have a proper ficlet back then because even I draw the line at writing srs melodrama about the impossible romance between a guy whose name i can't even use in the fic and a girl who was a toddler when he died.


End file.
